


The Revelation

by AgentCoop



Category: Banana Fish (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Comic Book Violence, Gun Violence, M/M, Motorcycles, Zombie Apocalypse, Zombies, badass ash lynx
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-18
Updated: 2019-07-18
Packaged: 2020-07-07 22:57:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19859392
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AgentCoop/pseuds/AgentCoop
Summary: Based on the gorgeous art bySalmonfoundHEREMax and Ash. Against zombies.  That's all there is!





	The Revelation

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Salmon95](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Salmon95/gifts).



The trees cast long shadows in the glow of the setting sun–twisting and morphing in ominous ways, like gnarled fingers reaching, reaching…

Max shuddered.

"You better toughen up, old man. It's a fucking shadow."

Max grimaced at this, and turned. Ash was cleaning his pistol, carefully wiping at the burnished metal with a dirty cloth. His hair fell across his brow, and his eyes were dark, barely flickering green in the dying sun.

"Will they come again?" Max asked. The very air around him tingled with electricity, with anticipation."

"They always do."

***

They did come, but it wasn’t that night, or even the next.

Max figured that this was as close to a semblance of normalcy as he was bound to get and so he tried to relax, tried to steady his breathing, tried not to jump with every snap of a twig or gust of wind.

It helped being with someone else. He was surprised by this, even though it should have been common knowledge. He’d spent weeks wandering alone though, after the infected had slipped into their barn, after they’d killed Jessica and Michael in the most brutal way imaginable. 

He’d sworn he wouldn’t join one of those militia groups or compounds. He would do this alone or he wouldn’t do it at all. He didn’t deserve safety, and he sure as hell wasn’t going to be caught unawares–like a sitting duck–just waiting for everyone around him to die.

This kid though? This...Ash? He was different. He was also trying to make it solo, he had also sworn off all others, but for some reason, he seemed to tolerate Max.

Ash was competent and dangerously intelligent. If anyone might make it out of this alive, it was going to be him. 

This was the only reason Max stayed. The only reason Max was following along.

That gut intuition.

That glint in Ash’s green eyes.

The kid wasn’t going down without a fight.

“Highway goes straight through the middle of the city,” Ash noted. He was leaning up against the base of a large tree trunk, one leg outstretched in front of him, and the other knee pulled up to his chest. There were varying guns scattered all around him–all clean, all ready, none of them loaded.

They needed ammunition like they needed water. They had to find it, because right now, his amassed weapons collection was useless. Nothing but extra weight.

“Alright,” Max finally answered, picking up a stick and tracing it through the dirt. “You sure on location for this firearm store?” We aren’t going to have time once we’re in there for reconnaissance or anything. It’s gotta be fast.”

Ash looked up, irritation plain across his face. “I know where it is.”

Shrugging, Max continued tracing his grids in the dirt. “Fine. Then we go in here. Not the main drag, but close. We place your bombs as we drive. We’ll have five minutes from placement assuming your calculations were right.”

“They’re right.”

“Okay. Then we’ll have five minutes once those are set to get as far as we can.”

Ash nodded. “Right. Then we get in the store, get out, and come back here. We get separated at all, we meet back here.”

“We get seperated at all and one of us is fucking screwed. We’ve only got the motorcycle.”

“Then one of us is fucking screwed,” Ash echoed. “You know what you’re looking for, yeah?”

“You’ve only told me ten times.”

Ash scoffed. “Well _sorry,_ old man. Forgive me if I don’t exactly trust you. I’ve known you for two full days and on the first, you wasted six bullets on a rabbit.”

Max flushed at this. He’d done it because he was jumpy and fucking terrified, and apparently even a six year stint in the army didn’t prepare someone for flesh-eating zombies. “I know what I’m looking for.”

“Good. Then help me pack those bombs. We’ll leave at sunrise.”

***

The city seemed deserted even as they drove in, the loud roar of the motorcycle angry and explosive in Max’s ears. Every minute that passed they got closer to the center, and every minute that passed he found it harder and harder to breathe.

The infected were here. They had gathered in the city spaces because there were more people to feed on, more chances to infect others and spread the disease. He knew they were here, and Ash knew they were here, and yet they didn’t see a single one as they drove the straight roads down the city center.

It felt wrong.

It felt horribly wrong, but there was no choice at this point. They needed that ammunition or they didn’t stand a fucking chance.

Ash had stepped off for just a minute to place the bombs in an abandoned bank. He was careful about it, gently setting them down in the dust as Max watched on from the front of the motorcycle. As soon as he set them though, he ran–jumping on the back of the bike yelling “Go, go, go!’ in Max’s ear.

And Max did. They had five minutes now. Five minutes to get to the ammo. As soon as that blast went off, it would hopefully draw the infected like swarms, and then they’d have another few moments to grab everything they could from the abandoned storefront and get the fuck out of Dodge.

The store was right where Ash had claimed–just a few blocks down and over. Max pulled up, and killed the engine, looking nervously around him. “It’s been five minutes,” he called quietly over his shoulder to Ash.

Ash didn’t answer, just swung a leg over and hopped down to the pavement. His face was drawn tight with worry and his eyes flashed as he surveyed their surroundings. 

“Ash. It’s definitely been five minutes.”

“I know.” 

Even his voice was taut, and Max tried to breathe steadily as a shudder of fear passed through his stomach. “What happened?” he asked.

“I don’t know. I don’t know, but they didn’t go off and so we need to move. _Now_. You go in. Find what you can. I’ll cover you.”

“What are you going to cover me with? You have no working weapons! Jesus Christ, I–”

Ash growled at him, baring his teeth. “Fucking go inside, get what you can, and get back here. Now!”

It was an order, and Max wasn’t going to disobey right now. He threw himself off the bike, then ran inside through the broken store windows, glass crunching underneath his tennis shoes.

The store seemed virtually untouched, which immediately raised alarm bells in his head. _Why hadn’t it been raided? Why had no one come here?_ Still, he scooped up packages of handgun cartridges and semi-automatic ammo and everything he could fit in the backpack and the bag over his shoulder.

It was deadly silent–he could hear his heartbeat loud and tangible in his ears. He swallowed thickly, turning to grab another few cartridge boxes.

And then he heard Ash’s scream.

Tearing open a box, he pulled the small pistol from the side of his jeans and started to load it as he ran.

Outside the store was a nightmare in progress.

They were everywhere.

The infected, swarming, coming out of buildings left and right and pressing into the street. Ash was completely surrounded, and he swung a large piece of wood with all his might, taking out the predators one at a time. 

There were too many of them though, and only one of him.

“Fuck!” Max swore, then he took aim. He managed to hit down a dozen of them before he ran out of ammo again, and that was enough–it was just enough for him to get a leg over the bike and start it.

“Ash!” he yelled. “Ash, get on!”

It was chaos around them, an eruption of noise and of groans and of the stench of the dead. He tried to breath through it, but his heart was rabbiting in his chest and he wanted to go, he wanted to drive, he wanted to fucking live–

and Ash grabbed him around the waist, hauling himself up.

It was all the signal he needed. Max revved the bike, then steered them right through the infected, foot to the gas as hard as he could. Ash was fumbling behind him--loading his own semi-automatic pistol–and then Max started to hear shots fired into it all.

He watched as zombies fell in front of them, slowed only when Ash needed to reload, and then he drove straight, drove true, drove out of the fallen city.


End file.
